BOCA HIGH IN SAFETY REPORT

A private publisher of reference books has pronounced Boca Raton the 50th safest city nationwide and the third safest in the state, with Coral Springs and Port St. Lucie ahead and other South Florida cities close behind.

While some local leaders rejoiced, others joined criminologists in warning that the rankings from Morgan Quitno Press -- and all such comparisons -- should be taken lightly.

"I would take these figures with a very large grain of salt," said Alfred Blumstein, professor of urban systems and operations research at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

The study ranked Boca Raton the third safest city of the 27 it evaluated in Florida. West Palm Beach, the only other city in Palm Beach County evaluated, came in 26th.

Mayor Steven Abrams said Boca Raton doesn't put any effort into getting on such lists.

"It's just a feather in the city's cap," he said. "And it's good material for the Chamber of Commerce."

Even so, the mayor said the rankings validate the police department's crime-fighting efforts and adds to the quality of life residents enjoy. The rankings don't influence city policy, but he wondered how the city's proximity to Interstate 95 impacts the rankings.

Scott Morgan, president of the Lawrence, Kan.-based Morgan Quitno, said officials shouldn't get too excited.

"One of the things you run into are police departments that get real excited about the ratings if they do well, and then if they start dropping, they say we don't know what we are talking about," Morgan said.

The ranking was based on the company's analysis of the FBI's 2005 uniform crime report statistics.

The company reviewed statistics from 371 cities with at least 75,000 residents, by looking at six crime categories: rape, murder, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and motor vehicle theft. Analysts weighed each category equally, then individually compared them to the national average, Morgan said.

But the FBI discourages comparing crime rates of cities because they are often tied to variables from demographics to the proximity of prisons and interstate highways, said Maryvictoria Pyne, a spokeswoman for the FBI in Clarksburg, W.Va.

"The methodology, ranking by virtue of the crime index or by population, is very simplistic in its approach and it is unfair to the cities at the bottom of the list," Pyne said.

Blumstein said Morgan Quitno's methodology is flawed because it gives equal weight to the six major crimes. Cities vary widely in how they report crimes, particularly aggravated assaults, he said.

"I give absolutely no credence to Morgan Quitno and they ought to be ashamed of themselves for printing something like this," Bush said. "I think West Palm is a very safe city. They are using some very flawed methodology."

Staff Writer Luis F. Perez contributed to this report.

Jennifer Gollan can be reached at jgollan@sun-sentinel.com or 954-572-2009.